Posted by Rich-CA on December 08, 2007 at 10:31:03:
Great examples, the nursing home thing. Something I found out about with the husband/wife separation thing. It only works in a non community property state. In a community property state, the two are treated as a single person EXCEPT if the business or ownership interest pre-dates the marriage AND if there has been no contribution to it from assets accumulated during the marriage.
hiding my assets - Posted by mark
Posted by mark on December 07, 2007 at 21:27:03:
I am in the process of forming an LLC in Ohio. On the Orginization/Registration of an LLc form ,it asks for a signature of an authorized representative of the newly formed LLC. How can I designate an authorized representative to sign the form so that I can keep my identity hidden? Does the representative have to have a share in the LLc or is there another way to accomplish this? (An attorney perhaps). In Bill’s book one of the main ideas that I took to heart is invisibility. If they cannot find me it makes it harder to sue me. That is my motivation for finding an answer to this question, any help is greatly appreciated.
Re: hiding my assets - Posted by Bill H
Posted by Bill H on December 08, 2007 at 18:41:01:
Good insurance and a good attorney are about as good as all the invisibility things.
The recent Colorado Case said a single member LLC for the sole purpose of avoiding suit was not quite kosher and the judge allowed the piercing of the corporate veil.
Any attorney in interrogatory or deposition will cover all the bases about trusts, LLC, etc.
Get insured, be up front, treat people fairly, get a good attorney…and you can sleep well at night.
Good Luck,
Bill H
Re: hiding my assets - Posted by Frank Chin
Posted by Frank Chin on December 08, 2007 at 06:09:11:
Mark:
The whole point of the exercise is that even if someone found out who you are, there’s still nothing they can do. As Rich said, anyone determined enough will find out who is behind the “curtains”, or sue to get that information.
For a small “owner operated” business, where you managed things, I doubt any “lawyer” would assume “operational” responsibilty", sign things for you, and then get sued when things go wrong.
Is this lawyer going to all your closings, and sign every scrap of paper this LLC is involved in?? Some contractor bought a building down the street from me, and put the builidng into an LLC. But, almost all of the paperwork filed to purchase the building, filings with the state, city tax authorities, the “mamaging member” of the LLC signs the paperwork, and his name is all over the place, all on file, all online.
If anything goes horribly wrong, the “managing member” of the LLC will be personally sued for negligence.
Usually, owners of small businesses, if married, would put the home under the wife’s name, the business assets under the husbands, to create the first line of separation.
Another way to create separation is to form a mamagement company to own a part of the asset, and then the remainder owned by members or limited partners each with limited liabilty.
When the orgainization gets bigger, you divide things up even smaller, so someone can’t grab you by the throat that quickly.
Actually, when I was a kid, I watched a story staring Kirk Douglas, where a partner in a bank robbery served time, Douglas took the loot, invested it in a successful Casino. The partner, now out jail, pointed the gun at him, wanted him to sign over the deed for the Caino. Douglas signed it, handed it over with a smile.
His partner thought he owned the hotel. But Douglas’s henchmen told this guy, some corporation holds the lease to the building, so the deed means nothing. The man said “ok, I’ll take the money from the casino”.
Well, he can’t, as another operating company runs the casino, and if he takes that, yet another company owns the licenses to the casino, and a former bank robber can’t get a license!!
The point being, things can be set up where even if someone holds a gun to you, there’s still nothing they can do.
One even better example is the running of “nursing homes”, something where things can easily go wrong. They was a news story thet ran recently reportings immense amounts of negligience was involved, but no one held accoutable.
Why??
The operators separated out things so one entity holds the nursing home licenses, another the lease on the buildigns, another hires the nurses, another runs one home, but not another, another buys supplies etc. There were dozens upon dozens of entities. Some entities ownes parts of other entities and so forth.
In other words, hiding in plain sight. They got the organization chart printed in the paper, but yet no one can be pinned down.
That’s the secret.
Frank Chin
Re: hiding my assets - Posted by Rich-CA
Posted by Rich-CA on December 07, 2007 at 22:04:21:
If the person suing you has a strong enough case, a judge can order records opened and people found. The main thing these complicated schemes do is discourage those with weak or hard to prove cases.
The only way to be truly invisible is to use all cash and live in places that don’t run background checks (like the ones who rent to illegals).
Re: whats the name of the movie? - Posted by Al
Posted by Al on December 11, 2007 at 14:16:49:
hey frank what movie was that?
sounds interesting